g that Titian alone deserved the name of painter.--He was wont to
call Cronaca's church of S. Francesco al Monte "his lovely peasant
girl," and Ghiberti's doors in the Florentine Baptistery "the Gates of
Paradise."--Somebody showed him a boy's drawings, and excused their
imperfection by pleading that he had only just begun to study: "That
is obvious," he answered. A similar reply is said to have been made to
Vasari, when he excused his own frescoes in the Cancelleria at Rome by
saying they had been painted in a few days.--An artist showed him a
Pieta which he had finished: "Yes, it is indeed a _pieta_ (pitiful
object) to see."--Ugo da Carpi signed one of his pictures with a
legend declaring he had not used a brush on it: "It would have been
better had he done so."--Sebastiano del Piombo was ordered to paint a
friar in a chapel at S. Pietro a Montorio. Michelangelo observed, "He
will spoil the chapel." Asked why, he answered, "When the friars have
spoiled the world, which is so large, it surely is an easy thing for
them to spoil such a tiny chapel."--A sculptor put together a number
of figures imitated from the antique, and thought he had surpassed his
models. Michelangelo remarked, "One who walks after another man, never
goes in front of him; and one who is not able to do well by his own
wit, will not be able to profit by the works of others."--A painter
produced some notably poor picture, in which only an ox was vigorously
drawn: "Every artist draws his own portrait best," said
Michelangelo.--He went to see a statue which was in the sculptor's
studio, waiting to be exposed before the public. The man bustled about
altering the lights, in order to show his work off to the best
advantage: "Do not take this trouble; what really matters will be the
light of the piazza;" meaning that the people in the long-run decide
what is good or bad in art.--Accused of want of spirit in his rivalry
with Nanni di Baccio Bigio, he retorted, "Men who fight with folk of
little worth win nothing."--A priest who was a friend of his said, "It
is a pity that you never married, for you might have had many
children, and would have left them all the profit and honour of your
labours." Michelangelo answered, "I have only too much of a wife in
this art of mine. She has always kept me struggling on. My children
will be the works I leave behind me. Even though they are worth
naught, yet I shall live awhile in them. Woe to Lorenzo Ghiberti if he
had not